The highlight of the collection was a rare first English edition of Gerard Mercator´s Atlas, 1636, which sold for $35,380.

CHICAGO, IL.- A crowded sales-room, busy phone lines and aggressive internet bidding contributed to strong prices realized at Leslie Hindman Auctioneers highly successful Fine Books and Manuscripts auction in Chicago on August 12. Director Mary Williams said, We are delighted with the results, which show an impressive upswing in the market for cartographic works and books with ornithological or botanical plates.

Private collections with property fresh to the market continued a trend of far exceeding pre-sale estimates. An impressive private collection of antiquarian maps and atlases included a first state of Henricus Hondius, Nova totius terrarum orbis, 1630, sold for $6,344 (estimate $4,000-6,000); and Nicholas Visscher, Orbis terrarum nova, c. 1658, sold for $3,904 (estimate $600-800). The highlight of the collection was a rare first English edition of Gerard Mercators Atlas, 1636, which sold for $35,380.

Fine examples of travel literature included the top lot of the sale, a first printing of Lewis and Clark, History of the Expedition to the Sources of the Missouri, which sold for $46,360 against an estimate of $8,000-12,000. Other significant travel works include a German edition of Arnoldus Montanus, Die unbkejante Neue Welt , 1673, sold for $4,392; a hand-written and illustrated Royal Naval Academy manuscript, c. 1800, sold for $3,904; and a deluxe signed edition of Henry Stanley, In Darkest Africa, 1890, sold for $3,416.

The sale included a substantial group of 16th century military fortification treatises, each with detailed engravings of structures and plans. Highlights of the collection included Pietro Cataneo, I Quattro Primi Libri di Architettura, 1554, sold for $3,904; and Gabriello Busca, Della Espugnatione et Difesa delle Fortezze, Libre due, 1585, sold for $2,684. Reflecting a similar excitement for books with prints, two volumes from the octavo edition of John James Audubon, Birds of America, 1840, sold for $9,150 (estimate $3,000-5,000).